Tag: Indie - Page 6
News You Are A Cyberpunk Carmen Sandiego In Chinatown Detective Agency
Blade Runner meets The Da Vinci Code
"I'm one test away from being accepted into the Lupercalia... They want me to steal the 16th century edition of the Divine Comedy." Well, alright then! It's not like anyone's really using the dusty thing, anyway. That's the pitch at the start of the new trailer for Chinatown Detective Agency, a cyberpunk-noir...
News Hypnospace Outlaw Gets A Neat Retro-Styled Physical Release (With A Bonus CD!)
Yes, 1999 is retro now
The internet peaked around the year 2000, when websites were ugly-beautiful with rotating images, scrolling marquee text, and ten thousand fonts on every single page. How were you supposed to let your crush know that you were a vibrant, interesting character with a wide range of hobbies if you didn't have them all represented...
News Promesa Is A Dreamlike Walking Sim About Memory, Coming To Switch Soon
Don't forget
Promesa is 45 minutes long. It takes place in Italian corridors, Argentinian kitchens, half-remembered church steps, and sunny Mediterranean streets. You will do nothing but walk, slowly, through these vignettes, as two men — a grandfather and his grandson — talk about their memories. If Breath of the Wild is the Mona Lisa during a...
News There's An Indie Paper Mario-Like In The Works, And It's About Ghosts
Origami likey
It's no secret that, here at Nintendo Life, we're suckers for Paper Mario, a series that's gone from brilliant to perfect to disappointing to pretty good. Much like the plethora of farming games that have been coming out as an attempt to reclaim Harvest Moon's dropped crown, the era of Sticker Star and Color Splash (the two most...
News Mystic Pillars, A Beautiful Puzzle Game Based On Indian Culture, Is Out Today
One small step for man, one giant leap for Mancala
You may have heard of Mancala, the brain-tickling strategy board game that's older than the first recorded map of the world, but you may not have heard of its Indian variant, Ali Guli Mane. Originating in Karnataka in South India, the name "Ali Guli Mane" is a literal description of the board, which...
News Surprise! The Creator Of 80 Days Just Released "Overboard!", A Reverse Murder-Mystery
A youdunnit whodunnit
Narrative studio Inkle has made nothing but hits. The brilliant 80 Days imagined a scenario where you accompany standoffish buffoon Phineas Fogg as his slightly-simple valet and manservant while he attempts to traverse the globe; Heaven's Vault casts you as a retro-futuristic archaeologist in a universe that's forgotten its own...
Exclusive Weaving Tides' Lovely Launch Trailer Spins A Yarn
Sew pretty!
Storytelling and weaving have always been, if you'll pardon the pun, intertwined. From Penelope weaving a funeral shroud to Arachne weaving a tapestry that exposes the crimes of the gods, fabric and narrative are often seen together, something we can see in modern day language, too. The word "text" and "textile" come from the same root;...
News Sumire Is A Story-Driven Adventure Game, Out On Switch Today
With a 10% early bird discount
"One day is all we have," reads the trailer — and that's the pitch behind Sumire, a beautiful narrative game from GameTomo, the studio that localised Cuphead and SuperHot into Japanese. The game was featured in Japan's Indie World presentation, and follows the adventures of a young girl named Sumire, as she embarks...
News Konami Might Have Plans To Outsource More Classic IP Following The GetsuFumaDen Revival
"please wait for future projects"
Konami is reportedly open to outsourcing more of the company's gaming brands in the future, following on from GuruGuru's announcement of GetsuFumaDen: Undying Moon. The original game, Getsu Fūma Den, was released in 1987 as a Famicom exclusive. According to Konami's Shin Murato, who is also the producer of Undying...
News Get To Know Mutants, Gardening, And Death In Mutazione, Coming To Switch Very Soon
From the makers of Johann Sebastian Joust
Kai has no idea what's waiting for her on the strange, isolated island of Mutazione. She knows her sick grandfather is there, and he needs help — but she wasn't prepared for an island of kind, gentle mutants, who've been living here since a meteor struck the town over 100 years ago. Now, Kai must tend to...
News Devastating Photography Game Umurangi Generation Is Coming To Switch In June
Cyberpunk meets Pokémon Snap
There is no other game like Umurangi Generation. It's a retro-futuristic dystopian first-person photography game, set in Tauranga, Aotearoa (the Māori name for New Zealand). You play a young photographer, who's taking various photographs of their friends goofing around in various urban locations. Drawing its...
News Beasties Is A Pokémon-Meets-Animal Crossing-Meets-Studio Ghibli Game Coming To Nintendo Switch
Farm! Friends! Fight! F...match-3!
Sometimes, games are coy about their inspiration, even if it's practically written on their forehead — but Beasties, an upcoming PC and Switch game that just launched its Kickstarter, is not one of those. Beasties is a combination of monster trainer, match-3, and farming, with turn-based match-3 combat. It...
News Read Only Memories: NEURODIVER Gets New Trailer
Cyberpunk 2064
After being announced earlier this year for Switch, with a Q1 2022 release window, Read Only Memories: NEURODIVER has a new trailer to coincide with being announced for the Xbox Series X|S. NEURODIVER is the next entry in the cyberpunk point-and-click series, set in Neo-San Francisco (it's like San Francisco, but NEW), where you will...
News Rise Of The Slime Is Like Slay The Spire, But You're... A Slime
Slime The Spire
Slimes are so hot right now. Between Slime Rancher, Slime-san, and the mascot of Dragon Quest, people just can't get enough of these squishy little beasts. And, if you enjoyed the roguelike-meets-deckbuilder mechanics of Slay The Spire, now you can play that as a slime, too! Rise of the Slime casts yo
News LudoNarraCon Is Offering Free Demos For A Bunch Of Narrative Indie Games On Steam
Try 'em before you buy 'em!
If you, like us, are a fan of narrative indie games (think Life Is Strange, Kentucky Route Zero, Night in the Woods, and Oxenfree) then you should probably check out the LudoNarraCon virtual exhibition going on on Steam right now. It's a celebration of the very best writing games have to offer, hosted by game publi
News 'Buildings Have Feelings Too' Is A City Management Game Where You Play The City
It's out on the eShop today!
The word "but" is doing a lot of heavy lifting in game pitches these days. "It's Stardew Valley, but you're a cat." "It's a dating game, but you get to date pigeons instead of boys." And now, we present to you: "It's a city management game, but you play as the buildings." We're not complaining, though. We're quite fond...
News Samurai Gunn 2 Is Coming, And Will Also Star Characters From Spelunky And Minit
🐬🦆
It's been a while since we last saw news of colourful platform-brawler Samurai Gunn 2, but today, that changed. The official Twitter account announced that the game was not only coming out in Early Access on Steam this Summer, but that there would also be two very special guest stars. Ana from Spelunky 2 and Minit from...
News Read The Stars And Predict The Future In Mystical Narrative Game 'Grotto'
It's like you have ESPN or something
In Grotto, a new game coming to Switch later this year, you are the Soothsayer. People come to your cave, and ask you to say all kinds of sooths. Out of all of them, you are the only one that can read the future amongst stars and bones, and they need your help trying to figure out what will come to pass. You can...
News Celeste's Creators Are Working On A New "2D Explor-Action Game" With Secret Of Mana Vibes
It's called "Earthblade"
It's been three years since Celeste, the pixel-perfect platformer, first came out. Since then, the people who made it have banded together to create a whole new studio — Extremely OK Games — and have been hard at work on what comes next. Today, that question finally has an answer: Earthblade, a "2D explor-action game"...
News Skul: The Hero Slayer Is Getting A Switch Release This Summer
A bone-a-fide Metroidvania to test your skulls
What do you get when you fuse elements of Dead Cells, Hollow Knight, and Hades? Probably a game that's too hard for any human to ever complete, but also, you get Skul: The Hero Slayer, a roguelike about a diminutive skeleton who has to kill a bunch of bad guys. Just your usual, you know. The stylised...
News Oxenfree Gets A Surprise Sequel, Coming This Year
This one is Oxentwo, the next one is Oxenthree
We weren't blown away by Nintendo's long-awaited Direct back in February, but it turns out that they were keeping a lot of their Hot News under their hat for today's Indie World presentation instead. One of the biggest surprises - and we know it was a surprise, because they kept it until the very end...
News Forager Team Retaliates After Lead Dev Blames Them For Cancelled Multiplayer
A saga of minimum wage, late payments, and Steam bans
Don't be fooled: some of the cutest games out there have a dark side, and it seems like Forager - a 2019 "solo dev" project by HopFrog, real name Mariano Cavellero, that fuses Animal Crossing and Harvest Moon - is no different. The game was hugely popular, selling 600,000 copies in its first year...
Talking Point Which Indie Game Should Be "99"ed Next?
Nintendo's Battle Royale games keep coming
Tetris 99. Pac-Man 99. Super Mario Bros. 35 99. Flake 99. Oh, no, sorry, that last one's a delicious summertime treat, not a video game. But you get the point: we're seeing a new trend emerge, even though it's based on an old new trend: the Battle Royale. The premise behind the 99 series of games is...
News From The Creator Of Threes Comes Beast Breaker, A Ball-Bouncing Game About A Tiny Mouse
From new studio, Vodeo Games (yes, we spelled it right)
It breaks our little hearts that the fantastic number-sliding game Threes never made it to Switch, but... we get it. Just in case, though, if any of the people who worked on it are reading this: we would definitely play it. Just in case. But good news: the creator of Threes, Asher Vollmer,...
Feature Intriguing Switch eShop Games That Caught Our Eye - 31st March
Looking for hidden gems
If there's one painful lesson this scribe learnt in three years of 'Indie publishing', it's that getting noticed is an existential challenge. In an age of Super Indie publishers (should we trademark that term?) like Devolver Digital, Annapurna Interactive and Team17, it's entirely understandable that those companies and their...
News Cozy Grove, The Animal Crossing-Inspired Island Life Game, Makes Its Home On Switch In April
Guess it's time to scrap our idea for a game called "Grozy Cove"
Heck yeah, another game about sedate pastoral life! We know that there have been a few lately, but we just can't get enough of them. Cozy Grove is the newest game from Spry Fox, who you may recognise from hit mobile games Alphabear and Triple Town, and it takes a lot of inspiration...
News This Pikmin-Inspired Cultist Game Could Be Coming To Switch In 2022
"Control the hordes" was always a bit culty anyway
In a time where nothing makes sense and everything seems futile, why not worship one of the unknowable Old Gods? In newly-announced Kickstarter project, Worship, you can play as a cult leader, corralling your followers around like Pikmin, drawing symbols in blood, and building up a village to suit...
News Monster Harvest, A Pokémon-Meets-Stardew Valley Game, Is Ploughing Its Way Toward Switch
Harvest Moon-ster
How many more ways can we invent to say that a game is coming to Switch with a cute play-on-words that references the game's genre? The answer may surprise you. Anyway, Monster Harvest (not to be confused with Monster Hunter, Monster Rancher, or Harvest Moon) is coming to the Switch on the 13th May, with a physical release...
News ZA/UM Releases New Songs By British Sea Power For Disco Elysium's 'Final Cut'
Excellent news for fans of music that triggers an existential crisis
Disco Elysium, the political narrative/visual novel adventure/supernatural karaoke simulator/role-playing game that took the world by storm when it came to PC in 2019, is making its way to consoles this year as the new "Final Cut" version, which will add full voice-acting and new...
News Townscaper Is An Idyllic Toy-Like Game That'll Melt All Your Worries Away
Also, several hours of your life
As the top Steam review of town-building toy Townscaper says, "bloop bloop game make depression go away". Indie developer Oskar Stålberg first made Townscaper as an experimental thing, which he showed off on his Twitter as he added new features. Its instantly likeable style and the clever design made it a hit,...
News Nira Is A Island Survival Game Where You Can Fly Planes
It arrives on Switch this Spring
You know, survival games can be a lot of fun, but they tend to not let us leave the forbidding wasteland that we've found ourselves stuck on. But Nira, the debut game from one-man studio Baseline Games, has planes. And that means we can escape. Sort of. Nira's simple pixel style gives us Atari vibes, but from the...
News It's 1990, And The City Is Ablaze In Fire Tonight, A Narrative Puzzle Adventure
Don't you just hate it when things you live in are on fire
Honestly, we quite like the intro to Fire Tonight that's on the Steam page, so let's start with that: Maya and Devin are separated in a city on fire, in the year 1990, before cell phones or internet. They’re on their own, wondering about the choices that brought them here, how they met,...
News SkateBIRD Gets New Trailer, With Dev Commentary
Tiny Hawk
You are a bird. And you are a pro skater. That's the pitch behind SkateBIRD, folks: a game which takes the grindathon of a Tony Hawk game and mixes it with the concept of also being a bird. With a vague release date of 2021, after being pushed back last year, SkateBIRD will be coming to the Nintendo Switch "soon", according to the...
News 32-Bit Horror Chasing Static Creeps Onto Switch Later This Year
An audio-based spookfest set in North Wales
You know that feeling you get when the decade in which you were born suddenly becomes fashionable again, and teens start wearing the sort of outfits that you are embarrassed to have ever worn? Well, in video games, the equivalent is watching indie game aesthetics go through 1-bit, 8-bit, 16-bit and now...
News The Magnificent Trufflepigs Is A Narrative Game About Metal-Detecting
From the lead designer of Everybody's Gone To The Rapture
Imagine Firewatch, but it's set in the English countryside, and instead of being about fires and watching, it's about metals and detecting. Add in a splash of romance, a dash of intrigue, and the voice of Arthur Darvill (Rory Williams from Doctor Who) and you've got The Magnificent...
News To The Rescue Is A Cuddly Dog Shelter Sim That Supports Real Dog Shelters
Coming to Switch this Autumn!
For generations, many people have judged video games on one important metric: can you pet the dog? Breath of the Wild may have failed, but To The Rescue doesn't - it goes above and beyond. Not only can you pet the dog in this upcoming canine shelter sim, but you can also nurse them back to health, raise money for them,...
News A Musical Story Is A Funky 1970s Narrative Told Through Jams
The musical jams, not the fruit jams. We think.
Here's the skinny, hip cats. Like, we weren't around in the 1970s, but we've seen photos, and we've heard the music of Steely Dan, so we feel confident in saying that French studio Glee Cheese has nailed the aesthetic of the era in the trailer for A Musical Story. As Steely Dan might say: groovy, man...
News Comedy Cartoon Point-And-Click Later Alligator Snaps Onto Switch On 16th March
In a week, croco...deek
Fans of Undertale, Night in the Woods, and Neil Cicierega, look this way: the people behind all of the above have thrown their names and support behind Later Alligator, a collaboration between game developer Pillowfight and SmallBu, the Emmy Award-winning animation team. "This game looks extremely cool, not gonna lie. An
Video Beautiful Ghibli-Esque Platformer Hoa Gets A 7-Minute Gameplay Trailer
Make friends with bugs!
Hoa is unfairly gorgeous. The game was announced last year with a late 2020 release on Switch, but has since been moved to an April 2021 launch, and this is the first time we've seen gameplay. Charmingly narrated by Art Director and Co-Founder of Skrollcat Studio, Son Tra, the video shows off various mechanics, like making...
News Stardew-Like Coral Island Wraps Up Successful Kickstarter With $1.6 Million Raised
The game is planned to release at the end of 2022
We're only on our third month of 2021, and we've already got Harvest Moon: One World, Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town, Littlewood, and a massive Stardew Valley Update... but fans of the farming simulation genre always want more.
News Eccentric Indie Developer, Onion Games, Wants To Know What You Think They Should Make Next
Remakes of Chulip and Rule of Rose could be on the cards
It's hard to say what Onion Games are best known for. It might be their newer games, like meta-RPG Dandy Dungeon, which is about game development, or satirical RPG Moon, which is old enough to have been Toby Fox's inspiration for Undertale, but only came out in the West last year. It might be...
What if you're afraid of cards? What then, eh?
Anyone who's played Slay The Spire has probably spent the last few months wondering how to get another fix of deck-building roguelite monster-slaying, right? Neurodeck might have what it is you crave. Described as a "dark fantasy deck-builder" in which you fight your own phobias, nightmares, and fears,...
Video Astral Ascent Announces Upcoming Kickstarter With Kick-Ass Trailer
For people who prize promisingly pixel-perfect pugnacity
It's hard to say exactly when the pixel art renaissance happened. Perhaps it never quite went away. Nevertheless, it continues with the gorgeous-looking roguelite Astral Ascent, from the makers of the Dark Souls-like Dark Devotion. Similar to its predecessor, Astral Ascent is presented in a...
News Hades Gets Physical Release, Plus Soundtrack Download And Art Book, Available To Pre-Order Now
Please don't lick the Zagreus game card
Update: 23rd Feb 2021 - UK pre-orders are open now. Well, we were hoping for Zagreus in Smash, but we can settle for Zagreus on our shelf instead. The GOTY of many, Hades, is getting a physical release, which comes with a download code for the fantastic Darren Korb soundtrack and a big book of game art...
News Panic Co-Founder Tweets Out A Firewatch Secret In Celebration Of Fifth Anniversary
You can find it by following a series of clues
It's Firewatch's Fifth anniversary, and to celebrate the big day, Cabel Sasser - the co-founder of Firewatch publisher, Panic, and co-creator of the PlayDate - tweeted out a big secret about the game. Don't read past this if you want to discover it for yourself! We'll give you a hint: Search for
News Narrative Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Game Sorcery! Gets A Switch Release This Year
And it'll include all four parts of the story
You already may be aware of the work of narrative-focused indie studio Inkle, thanks to their recent Switch release of Heaven's Vault, or perhaps you know them from their earlier games, 80 Days and the Sorcery! series. Up until now, their fantastic Sorcery! games have remained locked away on PC and...
News Open World Vaporwave Detective Game, Paradise Killer, Is 30% Off On Switch
Whodunnit? Probably the developers, we'd guess
You may not have heard of Paradise Killer, the cult-favourite that secured a few GOTY nominations last year thanks to its excellent writing and bizarro cast of characters, but that's ok - it's best if you go into it completely blind, anyway. Fans of Ace Attorney and Danganronpa will love the mystery...
News World's End Club Gets Physical Editions With Goodies From The Game
Art books, soundtracks, enamel pins and more
Announced on the Nintendo Direct last night, World's End Club is an intriguing prospect for fans of Danganronpa and Zero Escape, and not just because the team behind it worked on those games in the past. Although we don't have a lot of info on the upcoming game, we know it's about a group of 12-year-olds...
News Turn-Based Tactics RPG Battle Brothers Stabs Its Way Onto Switch On March 11th
The original Battle Brothers are Mario and Luigi in Smash
The wildly popular Battle Brothers has almost 12,000 reviews on Steam, with PC Gamer describing it as "when Game of Thrones has a one-night stand with X-COM." If that description alone perks up your ears, then we really don't need to tell you much more about the game - e
News Teamwork Is Key In KeyWe, A Kiwi-Co-Op Coming To Switch This Summer
Do you have any proof that the postal system ISN'T run by birds?
Love Overcooked, but wish the characters were a bit... rounder? KeyWe might be what you're looking for. It's a co-operative game where you play as little kiwi birds named Jeff and Debra running a mailroom, trying to type out letters, telegrams, and ransom notes alike with nothing but...
